Recently, real-time monitoring of transport goods has been gaining importance. To accomplish this monitoring, the transport goods themselves or transport units that can be used to transport one or more transport goods are equipped with electronic devices that detect variables affecting the transport goods and can transmit them wirelessly (e.g. via cellular mobile radio systems) to a control center from which they can e.g. be queried by the logistics company responsible for the transport or by the customer. These variables include the current location of the transport good (tracking), current temperature, information about vibrations, current humidity or current light exposure, to name only a few examples. These variables can also be collected over time intervals and then be provided in the form of a profile (either by the electronic devices themselves or by the control center).
This real-time monitoring provides a number of advantages:                Identification and avoidance of deviations of the variables from their desired target status: for example, loading a transport unit into a wrong vehicle or keeping a transport unit for too long in a location with too much sunlight can be identified.        Increasing security: for example, unauthorized access to the transport goods can be identified in real time and automatically trigger alarms to the customer and/or logistics company, e.g. by SMS or email.        Compliance with evidence obligations of a legal nature: for example, for temperature-managed transports for which the customer or logistics company must demonstrate that certain temperature limits were complied with during transport, this demonstration can be provided in real time.        Improving processes for the logistics company: the logistics company can measure and benchmark their transport processes and individual components thereof in real time. Until now, this has only been possible with considerable work and high costs, if at all.        Liability relief        Reduction in insurance totals        Expansion of the transport portfolio        
Currently, however, there is no option available for monitoring air freight transports in real time. This is due to the fact that a necessary part of real-time monitoring is the radio-based transmission of the transport goods' variables by the electronic devices with which the transport goods or transport units are equipped. Radio-based applications that are to be used in aircraft are, however, subject to certification by the responsible aviation authority, such as the European Aviation Safety Agency (EASA) and Federal Aviation Administration (FAA). Both these authorities are currently refusing to allow aircraft transport of actively transmitting units that are not under the control of the flight operator.
The basis for issuing permission for such units to be transported in aircraft could, however, be a forced shutdown of these units or at least a forced deactivation of these units' radio modules during the entire flight, ruling out interference with the aircraft's internal radio and control systems.